1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to printing apparatuses. More specifically, the present invention relates to printing apparatuses having an image processing section for processing images and a plurality of movable print heads, wherein an image that has been processed by the image processing section is printed on a medium to be printed by ejecting ink from the print heads.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, color inkjet printers of the type that ejects multi-colored ink from print heads and forms ink dots on print paper have become popular as output devices for computers. Furthermore, recently, comparatively large color inkjet printers have been realized, that use a plurality of print heads to print on print paper, such as roll paper (see, for example, JP 2000-158735A). Such color inkjet printers are provided with an image processing section for processing images, and a plurality of movable print heads, and they eject ink from the print heads to print an image that has been processed with the image processing section onto a paper to be printed.
(1) The above-described color inkjet printers having a plurality of print heads can be expected to have a higher customizability, due to having a plurality of print heads, than color inkjet printers having only a single print head. For example, there is the possibility to realize an easy customization, such as allowing printing with only the other print heads when some of the print heads cannot be used as a result of a defect or the like, or grouping the plurality of print heads into at least two print head groups and printing a plurality of independent images with the print head groups.
However, even though there are a plurality of print heads, since there is only one image processing section for processing the images to be printed with the print heads, there are difficulties in the easy realization of the above-described customization.
(2) The above-described color inkjet printer may be provided with a temperature detector. For example the ejection of ink with the print heads or a cleaning quantity of the print heads may be controlled in accordance with the output of this temperature detector.
Moreover, in the above-described color inkjet printers having a plurality of print heads, there is the possibility to realize an easy customization, such as allowing printing with only the other print heads when some of the print heads cannot be used due to a defect or the like, or grouping the plurality of print heads into at least two print head groups and printing a plurality of independent images with the print head groups. Thus, providing an image processing section for each of the at least two print head groups into which the plurality of print heads have been divided is an effective means for realizing a color inkjet printer with high customizability.
In this situation however, even though there are a plurality of print heads, if, as mentioned above, there is only one temperature detector, there are difficulties in the easy realization of the above-described customization.